Ray Kurzweil was instrumental in developing the technology that goes into the Siri features of the iPhone. As a futurist, Kurzweil sees Siri as another step toward what he calls "the Singularity" — the technological milestone when our machines achieve artificial intelligence, the ability to think for themselves.

Futurist George Dvorsky is taking that idea not just to the next logical step, but exploring ethical concerns as well. What happens when machines are sentient beings that can suffer?

Dvorksy — futurist, transhumanist and a self-described cyborg Buddhist — will be in town as a keynote speaker during the revamped Moogfest, which launches Wednesday. Moogfest promises festival goers not just the latest electronic beats, but some serious brainpower on display, talking about mind-bending ideas that could shape our future.

Don't worry, Dvorksy says we're still a ways off from the Singularity. For now Siri isn't human in any sense, but an amalgam of algorithms that can translate our questions into quick Web searches.

But as a cyborg Buddhist, Dvorsky thinks about the deep future and how we treat our machines.

The culture is already starting to think of those implications of machines that are more than our match. The Spike Jonze movie "Her" offered an unsettling romance about a man who falls in love with the operating system of his computer. Scarlett Johansson's lovely voice seduces the audience into believing a machine has real feelings.

This month, Johnny Depp stars in the release "Transcendence" about a genius who uploads his consciousness into a supercomputer and achieves sinister power.

I had the chance to hear Kurzweil talk about Siri and the Singularity at the 2012 SXSW in Austin, Texas.

I remember tweeting out after his talk that my brain wanted to curl up into a fetal position — the guy was that impressively smart.

But his point wasn't that the machines are about to replace us or even rise up as in so many bad sci-fi movies.

Rather that our ever-smarter tools offer more human potential. Google estimates there will be 6 billion smartphones on the planet — that's approaching a little supercomputer for every man, woman and child who call Earth home.

The power of those connections across a networked global economy can't be underestimated. "A kid in Africa with a smartphone today has more information than the president of the United States did 15 years ago," Kurzweil said in his keynote talk.

The Singularity is part of the zeitgeist now, Dvorsky observed. "We've been talking about this concept for decades now, ever since Alan Turing talked about machine minds in the 1940s."

But Dvorsky is already thinking about the ethics of what the Singularity might mean.

Dvorsky applies the concept of Buddhism that reverences all sentient beings to the day when machines achieve intelligence. As technology advances, we may have to become more humane to our computers to remain truly human.

Dvorksy promises the same sort of sharp thinking about the deep future in his keynote address Saturday at Moogfest. He's one of a slew of speakers who will highlight the five days of a festival that aims not just to tickle your ears but fire up your mind.

"I think there's a real thirst, particularly among younger people for interesting insights," Dvorsky said. "They're starving with the banality of so much of pop culture that's been dumbed down and performed for the lowest common denominator."

Moogfest looks to be an audacious undertaking on the part of Mike Adams and the staff at Moog Music, an event on the scale that Asheville has never seen before. Yes, you can hear some of today's top musical acts, but better yet, you may come away with new ways of thinking about tomorrow.

This is the opinion of Dale Neal, who reports on business and entrepreneurship. Reach him at dneal@citizen-times.com or 232-5970 or @dale_neal.